ARB Retention Fee 2023

In 2022 ARB embarked upon an ambitious new five-year strategy to improve the way it regulates. Research and feedback from architects has informed a major programme of work to modernise the initial education and training of architects. ARB is also transforming the way architects access its services online, and developing a new proportionate CPD model.

One year into its corporate strategy, strong progress is being made. ARB remains committed to working with the profession to deliver the essential improvements detailed in the strategy. To help fund this continued work, the retention fee for 2023 has been set at £179. Architects will be able to pay the fee from Monday 24 October 2022.

Alan Kershaw, Chair of the ARB Board, said:

“To set this year’s fee the Board has had to balance the need for vital investment in ARB’s strategy with rising costs and economic challenges that are affecting every business and every household in the UK. ARB is a small and efficient organisation, with fewer than 50 full time staff. We understand that any increase will be unwelcome at this time of increases in cost of living. ARB’s retention fee remains one of the lowest amongst UK professional regulators.”

Stephen McCusker, ARB Board Member, said:

“Like many architects on the UK register, I have run a small architectural practice and am ever-mindful of the challenges involved. In setting the 2023 fee, the Board has considered the cost of living increases faced by everyone in the country alongside the need to modernise ARB. The objectives in ARB’s strategy remain crucial. I’m especially keen that ARB continues its work to update an educational model that is over 50 years old with a new model that could encourage innovation and improve access to the profession.”

The retention fee is set annually by the ARB Board based on ARB’s strategic objectives and annual business plan. As ARB continues to deliver its strategy, the Board will endeavour to keep the retention fee as low as possible. ARB is planning the upgrade to its information systems carefully with the aim that future years will not require the same scale of increased investment in IT transformation.

ENDS

Notes to editors

ARB

ARB is an independent professional regulator, established by Parliament as a statutory body, through the Architects Act, in 1997. It is accountable to government.

The law gives ARB a number of core functions:

• To ensure only those who are suitably competent are allowed to practise as architects. ARB does this by approving the qualifications required to join the UK Register of Architects.
• ARB maintains a publicly available Register of Architects so anyone using the services of an architect can be confident that they are suitably qualified and are fit to practise.
• ARB sets the standards of conduct and practice the profession must meet and take action when any architect falls below the required standards of conduct or competence.
• ARB protects the legally restricted title ‘architect’.

Architects will receive a personalised statutory notice which will include details about how to pay their retention fee online by debit or credit card, or through Direct Debit. ARB cannot take payment by cash, cheque, BACS, banker’s draft or postal order. Any payments made in these ways will be returned and Registration will not have been paid. The way employers can pay for architects is changing this year. If an employer plans to pay for architects, they can find out how from Monday 24 October 2022 at arb.org.uk/architect-information/maintaining-registration/annual-retention-fee/.

For more information visit arb.org.uk/architect-information/maintaining-registration/annual-retention-fee/.

The full list of ARB’s fees is also available online at arb.org.uk/architect-information/applying-for-registration-for-the-first-time/fees/.

More information about ARB’s role and work, with facts and figures demonstrating its performance in 2021, is available at arb.org.uk/publications/publications-list/annual-report/2021-year-in-review/.

More information about ARB’s five-year corporate strategy is available at www.arb.org.uk/5yearstrategy

For questions and information requests, please contact the ARB Policy & Communications team at media@arb.org.uk